A problem with setting up telecommunication connections today is the difficulty of contacting called individuals who are highly mobile. In general, persons wishing to contact a particular party initiate a call to a specific telephone associated with that party such as the party's home telephone. However, a disadvantage of this method of communication is that parties are not always in close proximity to their home telephone. Several technologies have developed in an effort to solve the problem of establishing communication with a mobile party. These include call forwarding, paging and cellular systems. However, each of these systems has their own drawbacks which inhibit seamless communication.
A communication system that enable real time call connection to a mobile subscriber establish communications using a combination of paging and call bridging. In these systems, a caller places a telephone call to a called party subscriber's personal telephone number which is routed to a bridging and signaling unit having an associated database. Information stored in the database is then used to initiate transmission of a paging signal to the pager of the subscriber. The bridging and signaling unit is arranged to hold the connection to the calling party for a predetermined period after the paging signal is transmitted. The called party subscriber, upon being alerted by his pager, can initiate a call from a nearby telephone to the bridging and signaling unit which bridges the calling and called party calls together.
In such systems, it is possible to transmit in the paging signal a subscriber defined alphanumeric identifier that represents known calling parties such as repeat or frequent callers. For instance, an alphanumeric identifier "DAD" can be used to identify when a subscriber's father is calling. Such an identifier would correspondingly be displayed on the called party's pager and alert the subscriber as to the identity of the calling party. These subscriber defined identifiers are often maintained in the database associated with the bridging and signaling unit. The alphanumeric identifiers in the database are typically cross-referenced with the automatic number identification (ANI's) of the calling parties' telephone or personal identifier numbers (PIN's) given to the calling party's by the subscriber.
Typically, a subscriber enters the alphanumeric identifiers in the database in a separate off-line procedure other than receiving a call. This procedure must be repeated periodically as new callers are regarded by the subscriber as frequent or repeat callers. This procedure can be inconvenient to some subscribers. Moreover, a subscriber must remember or record the required ANI's or PIN's that are to be used in entering the corresponding identifiers. As a result, some subscribers may not take full advantage of the ability to define and receive identifiers for frequent or repeat callers.
Further, the use of PIN's are required in accordance with conventional systems in order for a caller to be identified by the system independent of the telephone he used to place the call. However, in addition to the requirement that subscribers have to remember the assigned PIN's for entry during the off-line process, the corresponding caller would have to remember or carry a record of the assigned PIN for use each time he calls the subscriber.
Thus, a need exists for a more convenient and efficient process for entering alphanumeric identifiers in a communication system for frequent or repeat callers.